About Su Xiaobai

Melding East and West, Su Xiaobai draws upon the artistic heritage of his native China and modern and contemporary Western art to produce evocative, abstract paintings, composed of layers of oil paint and lacquer on squares of linen and wood. The combination of lacquer—a luxurious, glossy resin used as a coating on household furnishings for thousands of years throughout East Asia—and washes of oil paint—referencing such artists as Mark Rothko and Gerhard Richter—effectively unites ancient and modern, China and the West. While Su invites such interpretations, he sees each work as a form of meditation, absent of intention, centered on the quality of the materials and the relationships among them. His paintings are, at base, beautiful objects of contemplation, with their deliciously tactile, hard candy surfaces and muted harvest colors.